Not a Google error? 'Phantom' Pacific island Sandy found on 136-year-old maps

A "phantom" Pacific island -- dismissed as a modern-day "digitisation error" on Google Earth after researchers discovered it did not exist -- in fact appears on a century-old British Admiralty chart, it has emerged.

The British Admiralty chart from 1908 Photo: Auckland Museum

By Paul Chapman in Wellington

4:43AM GMT 29 Nov 2012

Australian scientists who sailed to a remote spot in the Coral Sea to investigate Sandy Island, which is shown on some modern maps, found only open water and concluded the feature was a recent cartographic mistake.

But the mystery has deepened after a librarian in New Zealand spotted the island on a 1908 British Admiralty chart.

The chart records it as having been sighted by a ship named Velocity in 1876.

Shaun Higgins, pictorial librarian at Auckland Museum, told the Telegraph: "We have an extensive map collection and when I read about the vanishing island I simply went looking through them.

"I had a suspicion the island might be on older maps, and it felt quite good to find it.

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Mr Higgins noted that a caveat to mariners on the map reads: "Caution is necessary while navigating among the low-lying islands of the Pacific Ocean.

"The general details have been collated from the voyages of various navigators extending over a long series of years.

"The relative position of many dangers may therefore not be exactly given."

He suggests the crew of Velocity, which is thought to have been a whaler, logged the island 136 years ago as a warning to other seafarers but may have recorded it in the wrong position.

"There are a lot of low-lying reefs to the west of where it is shown," he said.

"I guess how the island managed to appear, disappear and reappear on various maps and charts over time is just a mystery of the sea."

A Google Maps location of Sandy Island (AFP/Getty Images)

His discovery has prompted comments on the museum's blogsite, including the suggestion that the island may have been a sandbar that existed in the 19th century but has since been covered by the sea.

Another writer says he has a copy of The Times Atlas of 1897 which shows it.

Sandy Island appears to measure about 15 miles by three miles on Google maps, and supposedly lies midway between Australia and French-governed New Caledonia.

When intrigued Australian academics sailed to the location during a recent 25-day scientific voyage they were stunned to find nothing there.

Exposing the island's strange saga earlier this month, Dr Maria Seton of the University of Sydney said: "We wanted to check it out because the navigation charts on board the ship showed a water depth of 4,620ft in that area -- very deep, "It's on Google Earth and other maps so we went to check and there was no island. We're really puzzled. It's quite bizarre.

"Somehow this error has propagated through to the world coastline database from which a lot of maps are made."